The U.S. Army is sending the 101st Airborne Division, along with combat engineers from other units, to Africa in support of the international community’s attempt to halt the spread of the Ebola virus.
Roughly 1,400 troops, half of whom will be from the famous Fort Campbell, Kentucky, division, will help build 17 100-bed hospital facilities and a health care facility for infected patients, Army Times reported Tuesday. The Pentagon expects the total number of troops sent to the region as part of Operation United Assistance to reach 3,000.
“The most important thing we can do right now is get cases in isolation so we can stem this outbreak,” Dr. Steve Monroe, deputy director of the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Disease at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said Tuesday, the paper reported.
U.S. military personnel will have received immunizations for chickenpox, influenza, hepatitis, yellow fever and others prior to their October deployment, the paper reported. They will also be well versed in regionally specific training on Ebola prevention.
The World Health Organization believes that 2,900 people have been killed in West Africa as a result of the virus, and the Centers for Disease Control has said that 1.4 million people could be infected with the virus before the end of the year. Half of that population would be expected to die, The Associated Press reported Sunday.
• Douglas Ernst can be reached at dernst@washingtontimes.com.
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